Proper 20 Year A

Twelve Months of Sundays – Year A
Ordinary Time
Proper 20

Exodus 16.2–15
Philippians 1.21–30
Matthew 20.1–16

The wilderness wanderings of Israel are a regular New Testament metaphor for the life of the Christian family between Easter and God’s final victory. The grumbling of the people, redeemed and sustained but not yet home in the land of milk and honey, is sadly characteristic of Christians as well; or why would so many passages, in Philippians and elsewhere, warn against it? There is a constant tension between
believing in what has already been achieved and appreciating the scale of what has yet to be achieved. Stress one and people think you’re ignoring the other. The ‘now’ and ‘not yet’ are the regular left–right of the long march through the desert. Those who don’t appreciate this end up wondering why they are limping...


Taken from Twelve Months of Sundays Year A by N T Wright

Published by SPCK